Wolves at the Door Read online

  Wolves at the Door.

  Shifters of the Glen, Book One.

  Published by Skye Jones.

  Copyright © 2015 Sky Jones

  All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced or used without the written permission of the publisher.

  All events depicted are fictional and any resemblance to places and persons is coincidental.

  Editing by Lisa A Hollett at Silently Correcting Your Grammar

  Cover Design by DW Art and Design

  Interior Layout by Author's HQ

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Epilogue

  A word from the Author

  Sneak Peek: Wolf in the Woods

  Dedicated to: My mum. Love you mum.

  Acknowledgements

  I would like to thank my friend and critique reader, JM Stewart. I love working with you, lady! I also owe massive thanks to Kimber Vale for her fantastic eagle eyed beta reads.

  My editor, Lisa A Hollett, whose input is absolutely vital. And the lovely, Ellis Leigh, for recommending the fantastic Lisa to me.

  Massive thanks also go to my husband for designing my amazing cover and for being cool when my Wolf stories take me away from movie night!

  A huge thank you to all my readers. I love hearing from you guys and being in touch and words can’t express how grateful I am to everyone who reads my stories.

  Prologue

  It stood on the high hill, surveying the territory. Too far from home, it didn’t know the area well. Others of its kind were nearby, but they held no concern right then. A scent called it here, to this clearing in the woods, where the little wooden cottage sat. Centuries ago, a family had lived in the abode. A woodcutter, his wife, and daughters. The wife had been of a wanton nature, and the woodcutter found her fornicating with the night elves. Or so the legend went. Whatever the truth of the matter, they’d left, and since then, not many people came to the tiny cottage. A few bespectacled young men would descend on occasion. They’d spend their time out and about, trekking in the woods and over the hills. Measuring and counting and taking photographs.

  This night, though, the creature caught a scent and it wasn’t male. Not one of the young men who came to catalogue the local wildlife. Not this time. The door to the cabin swung open and a small shape stepped out, huddled in loose clothing and a long top with a hood covering her head. The creature knew the bundle of clothing contained a female by the scent tantalizing and taunting it, and by the generous curves evident even under the loose clothes. Making it yearn and want and need.

  Head cocked to the side, nostrils twitching, it watched the figure cross the space and go into the shed. It waited for what seemed an age before she came back out again. For a brief moment, she looked up into the hills, but it knew the dense trees provided enough cover. A blackbird sang, heralding the encroaching dusk, and the female glanced up at the sky. With a sudden movement, she pulled her hood back from her face, revealing a shock of long, shiny red hair.

  It stared, rapt. The way that hair caught the fading light made it shine with an array of color, from deepest russet red to warm gold. The creature felt its maleness fill with want. Sharp canines tingled in its mouth as powerful eyes took in every single detail of her face. It couldn’t stop drinking in the sight of her.

  Smooth, faintly tanned skin covered delicate features. Freckles dotted her nose and cheeks, and huge green eyes dominated her elfin face. Her snub nose reminded the creature of the Disney princesses human females wanted to be when young. This little girl had grown up to be one. A real, living doll. It liked dolls. Soon, however, others of its kind would find her…and want her, too. Yes, soon others would come.

  Chapter One

  I sometimes questioned why I moved so far from humanity. I’ve always loved wild places. The untamed areas. Those few remaining bits of wilderness still left in this crazy, urbanized world. But it is one thing to go visit these places with your friends, quite another to live in one…alone.

  The rain beat down hard against the windowpane, and I shivered as the fire dwindled. Soon it would go out, and I’d retire to my bed. The cottage housed but one bedroom, a small living room, and a kitchen with a simple table and an old-fashioned range. Cozy, the National Park’s office had called it. Tiny, my friends had said when I’d sent email pics of the snug interior. But whether cozy or tiny, this space was now mine for the next twelve months or so.

  When I’d announced my intention to move to the Scottish Highlands to take up a yearlong residency studying the flora and fauna, everyone in my life had been shocked. Words like crazy and insane were tossed around like confetti. My parents were the most upset. Fears of me being trapped for days if the weather turned severe gave my mother sleepless nights until she begged me not to go. But how could I refuse the job offer? The wildlife of these wet and windy mountains was what I lived for. The chance to spend a year as custodian of such a primal and raw area wasn’t to be turned down.

  Still, part of me would welcome the warmer spring days soon to arrive. The time when the nights would shorten and the tourists would return. I might not be quite as solitary a creature as I’d once believed.

  When among my friends and the hustle and bustle of city life, I’d long for solitude. Now the loneliness… Well, it got to me a little some days. Thank God for modern inventions. My iPod provided music, my laptop my favorite television shows, and most important of all—I had contact with friends and loved ones through Skype.

  A deep snuffle had me looking to the rug in front of the fire and smiling as my dog, Sandy, shuffled in her sleep. Her front legs twitched as if she were running across meadows, chasing rabbits. In her dreamscape, she probably did. Her fur gleamed golden in the amber glow of the room, and her nose twitched as she dreamed on. Soon, I would have to wake her to let her out for the night before we retired to the tiny bedroom.

  After making sure the fire was well and truly out, I cajoled Sandy into getting up and following me through the kitchen to the door. She hated going out for her final constitutional, but if I didn’t make her, she’d wake me at four in the morning, crying and fretting.

  A tremor rippled through me when I pulled the old wooden door back. Its creak never failed to give me pause. I smiled as my thoughts turned to my friend Suzy. Such a fanciful, fearful wisp of a girl, she’d have fainted clean away after a day here, never mind the nights. Suzy read books full of ghosts and demons and vampires. Then she wondered why she couldn’t sleep without a child’s night-light burning. She couldn’t even spend a night alone in her flat in the city. If her boyfriend went away on business, she would return to her parents’ home for the night. Yep, Suzy would fall apart if she had to spend but one night out here among the stars.

  I welcomed it. Despite my own unease at times, I relished it in an odd way, even at times like this when the rain beat down and the wind howled.

  Sandy paused in her snuffling of the grass, lifted her head, and gave a low whimper. I stiffened as I watched her. She didn’t normally react like that. She usually went out and sniffed around for ten minutes before finally having a pee and trotting back inside. Always looking as proud as if she’d brokered world peace.

  “Sandy, come on. Do your business.” I huffed at her. Annoyance became a cloak I wore to hide my unease. I put my momentary anxiety down to thinking about Suzy, with her ghosts and ghouls.

  But Sandy didn’t do her business. Instead, her head s
tayed upright and the whimper turned into a snarling growl. Hackles rose along her entire back, and for the first time since leaving home, my moments of odd disquiet turned into real fear.

  There could be poachers out there in the black night for all I knew. Men who killed animals illegally. And what such men might do to a woman alone, I didn’t want to think. The park ranger’s cabin wasn’t for three miles; leaving a shotgun I barely knew how to use as my only immediate protection.

  I called Sandy to me, and as soon as she reached the door, I pulled her in by her collar and slammed it shut, sealing us inside the cottage. I’d barred us from whatever was outside with nothing more than some thick, aged wood and an old, rusty lock.

  Shaking, I made my way into the small bedroom and drew back the thick blankets. Sandy curled up happily enough in her basket on the floor, and I gave her a pat on the head as I climbed into bed. She gave a loud yawn. Nothing fazed Sandy for long, and I sagged in relief to see her back to her normal, contented self. Clearly, whatever had her so spooked outside bothered her no longer. After reading for a short while, my eyes grew heavy. I clicked off the bedside lamp and closed my eyes.

  Tap, tap, screech. I blinked twice, not seeing much in the dark room. A yawn forced its way out of my mouth, and I struggled through foggy layers of sleep to full consciousness. Often, I would wake to Sandy turning around in her basket or even padding softly around the room, but as I listened, all I could hear was her gentle, rhythmic breathing. Tap, tap, screech.

  My bed lay right under the window and the sound came loud and clear while I held my breath. Then…nothing. Perhaps I’d imagined it. After a few long moments, I started to relax and my eyes grew heavy once more when…tap, tap screech.

  Shit! I might not be one for flights of fancy, but I didn’t like the sound. It reminded me of the way the witch used to tap at my window in my childhood dreams. Her long, gnarled fingernails would etch marks into the glass. Of course, they were never there when I awoke to the reality of bright daylight.

  Tap, tap, screech. Frozen in place by cold dread, I barely dared breathe. But as I stilled, trapped in the indecision of terror, the words of my grandmother came back to me, soothing my fraught mind. Whenever I used to dream of the hideous old crone who’d haunted my childhood, she’d tell me to stop being a “scaredy cat” and hold my head high. To face my fears, because nobody got the better of a Buchanan woman. Not even gnarly old witches who haunted little girls’ dreams.

  I could almost feel my spine become strong and rigid as Grandma’s voice washed over me in a rush of welcome memories. I was no scaredy cat!

  Tap, tap, screech. I examined the situation with my rational mind, and guessed it would be nothing more than a branch tapping and sliding against the glass in the wind. It certainly explained the regular, rhythmic quality of the noise. Happy to have a sensible answer for the strange sound, I slid back down under the covers and closed my eyes. Despite feeling reassured, I still slipped my hand out of the warmth covering me and rested it gently on Sandy’s head.

  Chapter Two

  The next day dawned brighter than the previous. The sun shone through the curtains hanging over the window, and I stretched with a smile as Sandy yawned and licked her nose. The strange noises from last night seemed unreal and dreamlike in the bright, cheery light of the room.

  As soon as I got up, Sandy jumped out of her basket and followed me, right on my heels. Nothing would keep her from breakfast. The morning feed was her favorite time of day, even more so than when we went out for our long walks. When I opened the kitchen door to let her out, the sun hit my face, warming my skin and relaxing me another notch. Today might be a good day to take some pictures. I’d wanted to photograph the small woodcutter’s cottage I was staying in for some time, but the weather thwarted me at every turn.

  Sandy did her business, then cocked her head to one side, ears alert. She took off at a fast pace around the corner of the cabin, and curious I followed her, bare feet ice-cold on the damp grass. I rounded the corner and came to a dead stop. Sandy stood under my bedroom window, sniffing at the ground determinedly. But it wasn’t Sandy who stopped me in my tracks, rather the stone-cold realization that no branches came anywhere near the window from the tree by the house. There was simply no way a branch could have been scratching against the glass last night.

  “What you doing there, girl?” I moved toward Sandy, who now pawed at the ground, before going back to sniffing again with a fervent determination.

  Upon reaching her, I looked down and nearly let out a scream. If I’d been a different sort of a girl, a girly-girl, I would have screamed in that moment. I did bite my lip as I stared at the ground, my heart beating hard against my rib cage. Deep, large footprints crowded under my window. They were definitely big enough to belong to a man, or men. The number of prints and the odd pattern they formed meant I couldn’t tell if they belonged to a single person or many. Amongst the indents left by feet there were a few paw prints scattered around. So they’d brought dogs with them? Planning to hunt maybe. I shivered with dread.

  The sounds at my window the previous evening came back to me as I stared at those footprints, and I swallowed hard. Poachers! It had to be. David, the ranger, had warned me about them when I took the research post. I wasn’t to challenge them, but I was to report any activity to him. So as soon as I’d had my morning coffee, I’d be giving David a call and letting him know they’d been at the cabin. They probably meant to scare me away. Didn’t want the wildlife here researched, documented, and protected. Bastards! Yep, I’d be giving him the lowdown on their nocturnal activity, all right.

  Three hours later, and the ranger had been and gone. He’d taken photos of the footprints and asked if I wanted him to stay for the night. I’d declined his offer. Something told me he might be more of a handful than the poachers. Especially since he’d spent all morning talking to my chest. It was at times like these I hated my huge boobs. They were always the center of attention amongst a certain type of man. Being petite but curvy, I either found myself with guys staring at my boobs or bum, or with boyfriends who helpfully told me how to lose the odd pound or two. It didn’t enamor the male gender to me.

  Still, I felt reassured that he lived only fifteen minutes away by car, if I needed him, and he’d promised me his satellite phone would always remain on. Any more trouble, and I should call him straight away.

  I decided to play hooky and read out on the lawn for an hour, wrapped in my favorite wool throw. I made myself a cup of tea and grabbed one of the kitchen chairs, dragging it out to place on the overly long grass of the garden. Who knew when we’d see the sun again? My jeans and jumper kept me warm enough, since the day had grown unseasonably warm, so I placed the throw across my lap.

  I’d only read about five pages when the sound of an engine had me looking up. A small red car approached down the gravel track to the cottage and pulled to a stop. Frowning, I watched as an old lady clambered out, adjusting her jacket as she stood and slammed the car door with surprising strength. She looked very old, as in late-eighties old, and yet she moved with the strength and grace of someone much younger.

  “Hello, dear,” she called out, walking over the gravel and onto the lawn. “I’ve come to welcome you to the area. I live in the farmhouse over the hill there.” She pointed with one long, manicured finger behind her.

  “I baked you some cakes and scones.” She opened her cavernous bag and pulled out a Tupperware container. “Don’t want you going hungry out here. I must say, I don’t really like the idea of a young woman alone in these hills.”

  I smiled at her, oddly touched by her gesture. “Thank you…” I didn’t know her name.

  “Elsie, dearie. My name’s Elsie.”

  “I’m Brooke.” I held my hand out and Elsie grasped it in hers, gave it a quick squeeze, and let go.

  “Let’s go in, and I’ll make us a cup of tea.”

  Sandy came running out to greet us. As soon as she spotted the retriever, Elsie gav
e me a beaming smile and grabbed my arm. “Oh, I’m so relieved to see you’ve got a canine companion. I have been utterly wrecked at the idea of a young girl out here all alone.”

  “I’m a scientist,” I said, trying to put some authority into my voice. The other issue with being so small was people not taking me seriously. “I’m trained to do this. I’ve got a satellite phone. The ranger is only fifteen minutes away, and I have a computer to provide a window to the outside world. I’m fine, honestly.” I paused, and then something made me carry on and say what I’d meant to keep to myself. “Or I would be, if those damned poachers would leave me alone.”

  “Poachers?” Elsie’s face grew serious.

  “Yeah. Someone came a tapping at my window last night. Reckon it was poachers trying to scare me.”

  “Or something else,” Elsie intoned darkly.

  “What else could it be? They left footprints, the idiots.”

  Elsie followed me into the cottage, and I motioned for her to sit.

  “There are things in these mountains and forests we can’t always explain.” Elsie settled herself into one of the chairs with a sigh. “This is one of the most isolated areas in the whole of Europe. Things live here many wouldn’t believe. You need to be careful while you’re staying here, lassie. Don’t be out late when the sun’s low in the sky. Always make sure you’re back at the cabin before dark. Don’t go too far into the woods, and always lock your door.”

  I grew cold at Elsie’s words and her somber tone. “I’m not planning on wandering around in the dark, don’t worry. But I did think I’d go for a walk today. I’ve got a map, a compass, and a satellite phone, in case the worst happens and I get lost. I shouldn’t do, though.”